Growing up in a musical family, Isaac Shepard began playing piano/keyboards by ear at the age of twelve and very soon thereafter joined the band his father, James, was singing and playing guitar in at the time. As a member of "Dave and the Reverbs," Isaac played keyboards at various soup kitchens, homeless shelters, social gatherings, church events, and random venues throughout Southern California.
Alfred Eric Leslie Satie (Honfleur, 17 May 1866 - Paris, 1 July 1925) was a French composer and pianist. Starting with his first composition in 1884, he signed his name as Erik Satie. In addition to his body of music, Satie also left a remarkable set of writings, having contributed work for a range of publications, from the dadaist 391 to the American Vanity Fair. Although in later life he prided himself on always publishing his work under his own name, in the late nineteenth century he appears to have used pseudonyms such as Virginie Lebeau and Francois de Paule in some of his published writings. Satie was a colourful figure in the early 20th century Parisian avant-garde. He was a precursor to later artistic movements such as minimalism, repetitive music and the Theatre of the Absurd.
Carly Comando: (TAKEN FROM HER MYSPACE PAGE) "I write all of my music off the top of my head but I couldn't transcribe it if I tried. I am classically trained but I cheated my way through piano lessons because I have perfect pitch and play by ear. I bet you could kick my ass at sight reading. Let's be friends! I wrote "Everyday" specifically for Noah Kalina's amazing youtube video"
Michael Laurence Nyman, CBE (born 23 March 1944, London) is an English composer of minimalist music, pianist, librettist and musicologist, perhaps best known for the many movie scores he wrote during his lengthy collaboration with the filmmaker Peter Greenaway, and his multi-platinum soundtrack album to Jane Campion's The Piano. His operas include The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, Noises, Sounds & Sweet Airs, Facing Goya, Man and Boy: Dada, and Love Counts, and he has written six concerti, four string quartets, and many other chamber works, many for his Michael Nyman Band, with and without whom he tours as a performing pianist. Nyman has stated his preference for writing opera to other sorts of music.
Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff ([O.S. 20 March] - 28 March 1943) was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor. He was one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, the last great representative of Russian late Romanticism in classical music. Early influences of Tchaikovsky, Rimsky-Korsakov and other Russian composers gave way to a thoroughly personal idiom which included a pronounced lyricism, expressive breadth, structural ingenuity and a tonal palette of rich, distinctive orchestral colors.